Charles Dickens, self publish?

Chella @ Honeybee Books

OK, so I know we’ve posted before about famous people who self published, but this one was new to me.

Having watched the film ‘The Man Who Invented Christmas‘ while on a long haul flight I found out that one of my favourite books by Charles Dickens was published by Dickens himself! He couldn’t get his usual publishers interested in funding the book – Christmas as a theme was old hat and his last book (Martin Chuzzlewit) hadn’t been as big a success as they had hoped. Despite mounting financial pressures Dickens was illuminated by belief in his short story, and managed to find the funds himself, even commissioning the artist, who was sketching at the same time as Dickens was writing.

‘A Christmas Carol – a ghost story of Christmas‘ was finally finished on December 2nd, just weeks before Christmas, and the printed books didn’t even get into the shops until December the 19th. But despite all the worries, it was a monumental and unquestionable success, it’s first run of 6,000 copies sold out by Christmas eve.

Well – another great self publishing story! However, if you want your books for Christmas these days, please do get your text to us by October!